Wink Poppy Midnight(19)
“Peace, everyone. Peace. The next thing we know, we’ll all be so distracted fighting that we won’t notice when these two sneak off right underneath our noses, like they’re the cunning, tricksy heroes and we’re the simpleminded villains in a children’s book.”
She looked at me. Glared at me.
“And I’m not going to let that happen, because I want to see how your little unicorn underwear girlfriend kisses, Midnight. I want to make sure she’s good enough for you. The Yellows are going to watch us all and then help me decide if I can allow a past lover of mine to be with this freckled little barnyard girl.”
My mind started racing with all the fighting things Alabama had told me: Stay relaxed, bend your knees, kicking isn’t sissy, be prepared to run . . .
“Five against two, I don’t care. We’re not doing it, Poppy. I’d let your Yellows beat me bloody before I’d make Wink kiss you.”
But suddenly Wink’s hand was on my arm, and she was moving it back and forth in that gentle way she had. “It’s all right, Midnight. Let’s just do it and move on.” She got on her tiptoes, lips to my ear. “They want you to fight them. Don’t give them what they want. Let’s just play along and act like we don’t care.”
She put her heels back on the ground, turned, and walked up to Poppy. She placed her freckled hands on Poppy’s flawless cheeks, ran her thumbs over Poppy’s arched blond eyebrows, pulled her face down . . .
And kissed her.
No one had ever taken Poppy by surprise before. Not ever.
One second . . . two . . .
And then Poppy’s shoulders relaxed, her eyes closed . . .
Her lips started moving under Wink’s . . .
The kiss went on. And on. Soft and slow and lips and girl, girl, girl.
Thomas and Briggs stopped eating tomatoes and looking sulky and aggressive. They leaned forward, shoulders almost touching.
. . . the kiss . . .
Buttercup and Zoe held hands and stared. Zoe’s mouth was open a little bit.
. . . the kiss . . .
The light was now an eerie twilight blue, and the forest had gone dark, and we’d promised Mim we’d be home an hour ago.
. . . the kiss . . .
Wink pulled back. Just like that. Snap. She put her hands back in her pockets, spun around, and came back to me.
“Your turn,” Wink said, and gave me her ear-popping smile.
I didn’t do it.
I just took Wink’s hand and walked right past the stunned-looking Poppy and the stunned-looking Yellows, right into the dusky black woods, not another word.
No one tried to stop us. No one said anything at all, except Poppy, who called out my name, just once. But I didn’t turn around.
THAT PERT PERT pert little redhead.
Things were starting to get a little out of control, but I knew I could handle it, I’m Poppy, for f*ck’s sake. I never give up, ever, I don’t have it in me.
I told Briggs to meet me at midnight in my backyard between the lilac bushes and then I told Thomas to come to my bedroom at eleven and we were both mostly naked when Briggs found us, just as I’d planned, Thomas with his hands sliding up my bare back and me with my face in his blond hair and my knees gripping his hipbones, just as he liked.
Thomas’s younger sister died, she drowned in the Blue Twist River when she was eight years old, and Thomas was supposed to be watching her when it happened. Their father went crazy, he’s in an institution and is considered dangerous to himself and others, and Thomas, oh how sad he is, how he worries about me whenever I hang out at the river, worries I’ll slip in and disappear in an instant, just like his dead baby sister, and I like his sadness, I do, but it’s not enough, not enough to stop me.
Briggs swore revenge on Thomas, like a character in a book, and I laughed out loud and asked if they were going to duel at sunrise because I’d like to place bets on who would kill who . . . and then Briggs turned his anger on me, and my god I had them both wrapped around my damn finger, it was too easy. Briggs said I was going to get what was coming to me, that I’d led them both on, and turned their friendship to ash, very dramatic, especially for Briggs, and it was all so perfect, I wouldn’t have wished for more if I’d done it on a falling star.
Thomas started crying then, soft, quiet tears down his tanned cheeks, and I will say this, he was hot even when he cried, just like Midnight, and I felt a twinge in my heart then, just a twinge, just a flicker. Thomas didn’t swear or make threats like Briggs, but then, the quiet ones are the ones you have to watch out for.
THE HERO ATE dinner with us, and afterward he asked to see my bedroom, but I shared it with Peach and Bee Lee, so I didn’t take him there. Mim had a late-night reading and the twins were camping in the woods. Felix had a girlfriend already, he was like Leaf in that way, and the two of them had claimed the hayloft. His girl was pretty and gentle, with rosy cheeks and bashful eyes, but Mim had given Felix the Bliss and Baby talk recently, so I wasn’t worried.
The Three Billy Goats Gruff boy had dark hair and two different-colored eyes. Blue and green.
Different-colored eyes meant a lot of things.
A curse.
Bad luck.
Madness.
A withered soul.
A pact with the devil.
A family secret.
A lie.